Admission Requirements
The Doctor of Physical Therapy Program is a Selective Admissions Program, which means not every student in the applicant pool may be accepted. Admission to the Doctor of Physical Therapy Program is competitive and enrollment in the program is limited because of available faculty, space, financial, and clinical resources. Requirements for admission to the program include:
- A baccalaureate degree from a college or university accredited by an accrediting agency recognized by both the U.S. Department of Education (ED) and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) with a minimum GPA of 3.0 on a 4.0 scale documented with official transcripts. The degree need not be completed at time of application but must be completed prior to program matriculation.
- Completion of the following prerequisite coursework from an accredited institution with a grade of “C” or better, prior to the start of DPT coursework.
- Sciences – Science GPA must be > 3.0 on a 4.0 scale. Courses may not be > five years old. Two-thirds of Science prerequisites (approximately 21 credit hours – see prerequisite table below) must be completed to be considered for the application process. Only completed and transcripted courses will be considered. Therefore, fall semester courses from the year of application will not be considered in the application. Courses must be one year (two semesters or three quarters) each with a laboratory component for the following:
- Anatomy and Physiology – one semester each or a combined two semester series. (Human preferred; mammalian acceptable. Exercise Physiology does not count toward this requirement.)
- Physics (either algebra/trigonometry based or calculus based.)
- Chemistry (general, organic, biochemistry all acceptable.)
- Biology (Botany excluded.)
- Humanities and Social Sciences - one course in each of the following areas:
- Psychology
- Sociology
- Statistics
- Completion of at least 80 verifiable clinical observation hours completed with a licensed physical therapist. At least 20 hours each are required to be in an in-patient setting and in an outpatient setting.
- Completion of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) < five years prior to application. Since admission is a competitive process, combined verbal/quantitative scores above 300 are recommended as well as an analytical score of 4 or above.
- Three Letters of Recommendation from
- A professor who is qualified to assess your academic performance.
- A licensed physical therapist.
- A non-family member. A pastoral reference is highly recommended.
Top applicants will be invited for an interview followed by applicant ranking determined by:
- Overall GPA 15%
- Science GPA 15%
- GRE Verbal 10%
- GRE Quantitative 10%
- GRE Analytical 20%
- Interview 25%
- Letters of Recommendation 5%
IWU Undergraduate Student Admission Criteria and Process:
- Must have completed at least 50% of their credit hours at IWU with baccalaureate degree conferred by IWU.
- IWU course work must be completed within two years of application deadline.
- In addition, if all general admission criteria are met, IWU applicants will receive an automatic invitation to the interview process and will not be ranked to determine interview eligibility.
- The DPT program has an articulation agreement with Taylor University in Upland, Indiana, such that students awarded a Taylor baccalaureate degree who have completed at least 50% of their credit hours at Taylor within the last two years will also receive an automatic invitation to interview without ranking.
